Expert: NFL labor deal possible 'within next week or so'

George Cohen, who once taught a course at Georgetown University called the "Art of Collective Bargaining," is now the federal mediator in the middle of the NFL contract talks. That's a source of optimism for one legal observer.

"George is very good," says Roger Abrams, a law professor at Northeastern University in Boston and author of Sports Justice, a book about major sports law cases on the past century.

"I've always been very optimistic about the prospects for reaching a deal. Now, I think it's possible they may reach a deal within the next week or so," adds Abrams.

As director of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, Cohen presided over talks for a fourth consecutive day Monday at his office in Washington, D.C. Both sides agreed to the federal mediation, which is non-binding.

Under a directive from Cohen, both sides also have declined comments on the talks. But as Bob Batterman, an NFL outside lawyer, was leaving the talks Sunday he did allow that Cohen is a "first-class mediator."

Cohen, a graduate of Cornell University Law School, was appointed to his post in 2009 by President Obama.

"He's a former union-side attorney," said Abrams. "He in fact represented the Major League Baseball Players Association in the 1995 litigation before Judge (Sonia) Sotomayor that ended the '94 and '95 baseball strike. It's a major step (in the NFL talks) to move toward mediation."

The current collective bargaining agreement expires at the end of the day March 3, and there is a possibility the NFL could impose a player lockout. Abrams said there are "good people" on both sides of the talks.

"Jeff Pash, who I've know for a couple of years, is the general counsel/vice president of the NFL. ... Jeff would not allow a lockout to occur unless it was absolutely necessary," said Abrams.

"He understands collective bargaining, and so do the folks on the union side even though this is (NFL Players Association executive director DeMaurice Smith's) first set of negotiations in his current position. They have lots of folks there that know exactly what they're doing."

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